They duked it out next to the steps of the 6 train at 28th Street and Park.
He was a black man of about 30, in a Yankee cap, baggy jeans and an oversize black bomber jacket.
She was about the same age, with freckles on light brown skin, in jeans, a denim jacket, and clunky white high-tops.
I walked by around 1:22, en route to grabbing lunch. I saw her right cross catch the guy in the side of the head. It looked like a hockey fight: both were clutching the other’s clothing in an effort to impede the other’s punching power.
I happened to be the first one by. I walked about 10 feet past and stopped, adrenaline starting to course as I figured out what to do: jump in, shout something from the perimeter about the cops coming, or continue walking, keeping intact New Yorkers’ hard-earned reps, accurate or not, for walking away in the face of human need.
I sized up the situation. The man was clearly not the aggressor, doing all he could to keep the woman from punching him. Every minute or so, she would throw a right, narrating the fight with statements like “No good…no job…motherf***er!!!”
By this time, a handful–maybe 10–people had amassed, all keeping a good 10 feet between them and the combatants. I imagined how my interjection would be received: They’d size up a very white dude in business-casual attire and probably tell me to beat it.
I crossed 28th and called 9-1-1 from a payphone. The dispatcher asked the details. I gave them. She asked for a number. I gave them my cell.
Back at the punch-up, it was the same old story, the woman throwing a haymaker every minute or so, the guy trying to talk her down, their tangled mass occasionally spilling into a car in the parking lot. A tiny Latina with a sandwich sign proclaiming the merits of eyebrow-threading moved to another section of the corner.
A guy in dreads emerged from the subway stairs and attempted to break them up with his soothing tone. “I ain’t talkin’ to you, I talkin’ to him!” came the woman’s predictable response, gesturing toward Mr. No Job/No Good.
The situation seemed to be pretty much in hand. The cops would come, the couple would be arrested, the crowd would break up. I headed to the deli and ordered.
Around 1:30, I headed back toward that corner. The fighting couple was walking toward me, crossing 28th just west of Park. She was in the lead, mumbling angrily. He was six feet behind her, trying to catch up, trying to plead his case. He fiddled with what looked like a PSP player on a string around his neck, making sure it wasn’t damaged in the fracas.
A cop car blinked its lights and sounded its siren on Park, but went on past 28th.
At 1:40, I got a call on my cell. PD. I told the dispatcher they’d missed the action.
I opened the Times and ate my Caesar wrap.